


How the Light Gets In

by Rakefetzyz



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Blind Character, Blindness, Canon Disabled Character, Gen, Senses, Stick is dead when this takes place but his presence is there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-26
Updated: 2018-09-27
Packaged: 2019-07-17 11:29:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16094771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rakefetzyz/pseuds/Rakefetzyz
Summary: This story is a sort of fix it. But instead of trying to fix the way Stick treated Matt when Matt was a child it tries to show what Matt would do differently if he were in Stick's position, mentoring a blind child with enhanced senses.





	1. Luke's Visit

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place after The Defenders and assumes that Matt recovered after Midland Circle and returned to his old life, which doesn't seem likely now that I've seen the season 3 teasers. It is not compatible with any of the individual show seasons that followed the Defenders.

  
Ring the bells that still can ring  
Forget your perfect offering  
There is a crack in everything  
That's how the light gets in  
\---Leonard Cohen, Anthem  
  
  


"One of your long underwear friends is coming,” Foggy looked down on the street from Matt's window.  


Since Matt had returned alive several weeks after the Midland Circle building collapsed on him, Foggy came to visit frequently.  


Sometimes Karen came too. But Matt had hurt her so much, he knew that putting things right with her was going to take more time.  


"Which one?” Matt asked from where he sat on his couch. He tilted his head to listen rather than wait for an answer. “Luke.”  


He turned back to Foggy. “You need to stop calling us that.”  


It wasn’t even an accurate description. Matt was the only one with a costume. Danny was considering the idea. But Jessica wouldn’t be caught dead in one and Luke liked his hooded sweatshirts.  


What Luke didn’t like was Matt’s methods as Daredevil. Luke thought Matt used excessive force.  


"Luke?” he greeted his guest, letting the tall man in.  


"Good evening, Matt, Mr. Nelson” Luke went to sit in a chair opposite the couch.  


Matt brought beers from the kitchen for all three of them and returned to his place on the couch.  


"What brings you here, Luke?”  


Luke explained that he and Claire were hosting a ten-year-old girl for a month. Her father, a man named Roy Greene, had been in Seagate with Luke. Luke told them that Roy was also falsely convicted and also subjected to experiments that resulted in unusual abilities. He had taught at Georgia State for a few years before his trouble started and married a woman who taught there too. They had a daughter named Evie, who seemed to have inherited her father’s powers.  


Luke's friend was murdered two years ago by the mobsters who framed him, but Luke had kept in touch with the widow and the little girl. He had a special interest in the child's welfare because of her abilities.  


The mother was in California taking a summer course at Berkeley. She had planned to take the girl with her.  


"But I invited Evie to spend the month with me and Claire. Down in Georgia she’s mostly with her mother's people who are white. I want her to spend some time in Harlem to learn about her African American heritage.  


Matt gave an embarrassed laugh. When you were blind, “color blindness” went with the territory, even for him. A heartbeat revealed a lot of things about a person but skin tone was not one of them.  


Yet Matt respected Luke and Luke's community. He wasn’t sure how to explain all that, so he just sort of chuckled.  


Luke chuckled too. “I get it, Matt. But I do want her to learn about her father’s heritage.”  


Where do I come in?” Matt asked.  


"The same people who killed my friend blinded the little girl. Her skin is almost indestructible like mine, but they could damage her eyes and they did.”  


"Why would they do that?” Matt was shocked.  


"They guessed she may have inherited powers. They wanted her helpless so she wouldn’t be able to seek revenge for her father.”  


"Blind people aren’t helpless!”  


"I know that, Matt. But some people don’t seem to. Three months ago they broke into her house and used lasers to destroy her optic nerve.  


"The powers that Roy had and that Evie inherited weren't the same as mine. They got the tough skin but not the strength.”  


"Just the skin?” Matt asked.  


"They got heightened senses, something like yours but not as powerful.”  


Luke was hoping Matt could help Evie learn to use her special senses to compensate for blindness.  


"But no playing Stick,” he warned. “No teaching her to fight.”  


"So a sort of orientation and mobility training for someone with enhanced senses?” Matt asked.  


"Orientation and mobility training?”  


"O&M. That’s what its called when they teach blind people to get around better.”  


Luke laughed. “And maybe just a touch of self defense,” he conceded, “so she doesn't get hurt again.

  
  
"Can you really take this on now?” Foggy asked after Luke said goodbye to them and started down the stairs. “You’re not all healed yet from the building collapsing. And you insist the city can't survive unless you patrol at night.”  


Matt said he had to do it; he knew what it was like to be a kid who suddenly couldn't see.  


"When the world goes dark, something inside you goes dark too. No matter how cheerful this girl acts or how well she seems to be coping, every morning, just for one second, she forgets and expects to see. And every morning she has to face another day with no daylight.”  


"Matt, you never talked about what it was like after your accident,“ Foggy said quietly.  


"I never wanted pity.”  


"I know. Remember that criminal law professor who felt sorry for you? She could state one hundred facts perfectly but you'd find the hundred-and- first fact she got wrong just to show her.”  


Matt grinned. “She deserved it.” He went on more earnestly, “But I told you this now so you can understand why I have to help the little girl.”  


I get it,“ Foggy answered, “And if you need me to help, I’m here. “


	2. Ice Cream

The next Monday afternoon Claire brought Evie to Matt's loft to introduce her. She was small for ten. Matt’s senses placed her height below Claire's shoulder. He thought she must seem especially tiny when standing next to Luke. Her heart beat nervously as she waited to find out what came next.  


"Uncle Luke or I will come get you at four,” Claire told the girl before bidding goodbye to Matt and starting out.  


Matt’s own heart was beating a little nervously too. He stood there for a moment not sure how to start.  


"You like ice cream, kid?” he asked finally.  


He wasn’t copying Stick.  


Okay, maybe he was copying Stick. But ice cream was a pleasant way to work on heightened tasting skills.  


"Sure, I like ice cream!”  


"Then unfold your cane and let's go.”  


"Thank you for the ice cream, Matt,” the girl said politely when they were seated on a park bench, licking their cones.  


"What do you taste?” Matt echoed Stick’s question from two decades earlier.  


"Vanilla ice cream,” she said. “It tastes real, not like fake vanilla flavor.”  


"It is real. The vanilla beans come from Madagascar. They’re stronger than vanilla beans grown in Central America. Try to taste the different milks and creams from dairies in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The sugar is cane sugar from Louisiana.”  


"You know what,” Evie began and Matt could hear an impish grin. “I think I’m going to need a lot more practice before I can taste all that stuff in ice cream. I think I need to practice every day this month.”  


"Very smart, kid,” Matt laughed. “But your Uncle Luke and Aunt Claire won't want me to give you sugary desserts every day. I need to stay on their good side. Maybe we could practice ice cream tasting once a week. Deal?”  


"Deal,” she agreed.  


Then, a bit wistfully, he added, “I wish I had thought of saying I needed more practice.”  


"You mean someone once did this for you?”  


Matt sighed. “There was this old guy called Stick. He came to my orphanage when I was your age. He helped me in some ways I hope I’ll help you. But he trained me to be a fighter and he didn’t want me to have any attachments to anyone.”  


"I’d hate that!” Evie said, “I need people. My Mom is going to call me every night. And Sophie - she’s my best friend – we text each other about a hundred times a day. If you hear my phone ding, that’s her.”  


"I’m not going to try to take that away from you,” Matt assured her.  


"And you're not going to train me to fight?”  


"I’m not Stick. And I promised Luke I wouldn't. But he agreed I could teach you self defense. We don’t want you getting hurt again.”  


"I have this special skin,” she said. “I can’t get hurt, usually.”  


"Usually?” Matt inquired.  


"Well, they did this to me. They made me blind.”  


"Yeah. I know how hard that is at first.”  


Evie seemed to consider this. “I guess you really do.”  


"So you learned Braille?” Matt asked.  


"I read grade two Braille now, all the contractions and shortforms. At first it was hard. Especially W. It doesn’t fit the pattern of the other letters.”  


"I remember finding the W tricky, too,” Matt told her.  


"You’re the only one who gets it!” the girl blurted out. “My Mom and Sophie are there for me. But they don’t know what it’s like the way you do.”  


"I think that’s why Luke asked me to help even though he doesn’t always approve of what I do.”  


"You know what, Matt?”  


"What, kid?”  


"I’m glad I have you and not that Stick guy.”

  
The rest of the week, up in Matt’s loft, he taught Evie to play catch without seeing. They started with a beach ball. Matt demonstrated how to sense changes in air currents as the ball approached as well as how to hear very soft echoes that defined the shape and position of the ball.

When Evie could catch the ball consistently, they moved on to a Nerf ball about the size of a basket ball.

“Can't we use a real ball?” she complained. “I don’t need a kiddy ball just because I can’t see.”

“Look, kid, my skin isn’t bruise-proof like yours and I already have enough bruises from certain activities that Luke prefers I not discuss with you.”

"Oh, right,” she sounded apologetic. “I forgot how easily you can get hurt. Aunt Claire told me stories about stitching you up.”

Matt just groaned. “I’m also thinking about my furniture and windows.”

As the days passed they worked with progressively smaller foam balls, one the size of a softball and then a baseball sized one. From there they went on to Ping-Pong balls and finally on Friday, Evie was catching tiny plastic balls the size of marbles. 

We'll do more on Monday,” Matt told her when Luke came to bring her home that afternoon. Luke said he had a busy weekend planned with a street fair and a concert at the National Jazz Museum in Harlem.

Matt was looking forward to the weekend too. Karen had agreed to meet him and Foggy at Josie's. 


	3. Nightmares and mazes

But when Monday came they didn’t continue the training. Monday afternoons were reserved for ice cream tasting practice, Matt decided, and for just letting Evie talk to her mentor. 

They were practicing with chocolate ice cream this time. Matt was explaining how to taste the difference between Dutch process cocoa and regular cocoa, but he could sense that something was troubling Evie. She wasn’t paying as much attention as usual.

"Matt, do you ever get bad dreams about the accident that made you blind?” 

Matt knew why she asked. While Luke and the girl were out at the jazz museum, Claire had called to tell him that Evie was having nightmares about the men who hurt her.

"I did at first. My Dad used to sit up with me at night. After a few months, I, uh, got them less often until they went away.”

“I think I scared Aunt Claire. I wake up screaming almost every night.”

Matt said he guessed it was harder for Evie because the mobsters had blinded her on purpose. Matt’s case was really an accident. And Matt had gained his heightened senses from the accident, too. Evie already had her abilities before.

“But I think your bad dreams will start to go away when you learn to use your other senses more and you realize just how much you can do without your sight.”

“Maybe,” Evie said after a minute. “I hope so.”

“Do your senses ever confuse or overwhelm you?” Matt asked. His own senses had become painful and debilitating before he started training with Stick. 

Evie licked her cone thoughtfully. 

“I was born with strong senses. I got used to them before I found out that other people couldn’t see and hear as much as me.”

“Your vision was unusually strong before…?” It made sense but it still surprised him because he had never had heightened vision himself and had not thought of the possibility.

“Yeah, it was.” she said, “My mom used to have me be her lookout when we drove on the highway. I could spot exit signs a mile before anyone else.” Evie gulped, fighting back tears. “Of course I can’t do that now.”

“No,” Matt acknowledged, “but when we finish working together I promise you will still be able to discern more of your surroundings than anyone.”

“I almost can already.” Her voice was lighter again as she returned her attention to the flavors in her ice cream.

“They used Dutch cocoa in this didn’t they?”

“Right. Your ice cream tasting is improving already, too.”

“Not that much,” she answered. “I still need lots of practice.” 

 

The rest of the week Matt used furniture and boxes to set up mazes and obstacle courses. He taught Evie to run through them without tripping or bumping into anything. 

She did kick a few of the boxes around and crashed into to a chair the first day. But since she couldn’t get hurt it didn’t really matter. Matt helped her learn to gauge the placement of all the obstacles and how their relative positions to her changed as she ran.

As soon as she mastered one course or maze he designed a more elaborate one.

As her concentration improved, she could run an obstacle course that looped three times across the entire length of Matt's loft.

“Will you teach me parkour next?” she asked.

“Not, right away, kid. There’s too much risk of being seen. Remember outdoors you need to look like an ordinary blind girl. That’s why I mostly save parkour for night.”

“Why do I need to look ordinary?”

“The people who attacked you thought that being blind would make you helpless. If they find out it’s not true they may try to kill you.”

“But I want to be a hero like you and Uncle Luke,” she insisted.

“You can when you’re an adult, if that’s what you want. Right now it’s the job of the adults in your life to keep you safe.” Matt sighed. The adults in his own life had not done such a good job.

The following week they worked on outdoor navigation. Matt taught her to use the spatial awareness she had learned in his loft.

“But outside you can’t appear to know too much about your surroundings. Not more than an ordinary blind person.

Evie complained it took too much concentration. She had to pay attention to the location of objects and obstacles at the same time that she concentrated on how other people would see her.

One day they went to meet Foggy for lunch.

“Why is he called Foggy?” she asked as they tapped their canes down the sidewalk.

“His kid sister couldn’t say Franklin when she was learning to talk. She came out with something that sounded like Foggy and it stuck.”

“Oh! Like Beezus in the Ramona books.”

At lunch Foggy let her know in a matter of fact way when she picked up her fork without feeling for it first. He was the right person to help because he was so used to being around Matt. 

By the time lunch ended, she had stopped making mistakes.

“Nice meeting you, Evie,” Foggy said by way of goodbye. “Do me a favor and try to keep my buddy here out of mischief.”

“I’ll try,” she answered with mock seriousness. “But I’m not there during the hours when he usually gets into trouble.”

“That's the story of my life, kid."

“Do you mind not talking about me when I’m standing right here?” Matt grumbled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Ramona books mentioned are of course the series by Beverly Cleary. To the best of my knowledge, Foggy's nickname was never explained on the show.


	4. A Gift

The last full week, Matt dedicated to self defense. He showed Evie how to kick at the groin and strike the neck, if an attacker came at her. 

“But don’t use real force on me, kid.”

“You have more bruises from last night, don’t you?” she asked knowingly. 

Matt grunted, “I’m not supposed to talk about that.”

But he could tell she was being careful not to make contact as she practiced her moves.

“Strike more to the side,” Matt instructed, “or the attacker will strike you.”

“I can’t get hurt, usually,” she reminded him. 

“Yes, but you need to prepare for the unusual. We need to make sure no one can grab you.”

By the end of the week Matt was satisfied that she could ward off an attacker or disarm a knifer.

 

Evie's last day in New York was a Monday. That afternoon they chose pistachio ice cream. Matt claimed that some of the nuts were grown in the San Joaquin Valley in California and some were from southern New Mexico. Evie was concentrating hard, trying to taste the difference.  


“Did you see that guy and his kid?” a man whispered to his girlfriend as the two strolled past the park bench where Matt and Evie sat. “They’re both blind.”

“I noticed,” the woman whispered back. “Poor little girl. It must be something genetic.”

Evie tensed and froze. Matt put a hand gently on hers to keep her from dropping her cone. 

“Don’t let them bother you. They, uh, don’t know squat about your genetics. I for one wouldn’t mind having the ‘can’t get hurt, usually’ genes myself."

“It’s not that,” she replied through gritted teeth. “It's—I hate when people call me a poor little girl!”

“I’ve always hated it too. I still get that pity sometimes, even in court. It’s your choice to ignore it or try to educate people about how competent a blind person can be.”

Evie still sat rigid and tense.

“Most people don’t intend to hurt us. They’re just ignorant,” Matt continued. “But then there was the thug who offered condolences to my dad when I was blinded. I don’t mean people like that… that …”

“Ha!” Evie said, relaxing a little, “you’re trying to think of a word you can say in front of me.”

“You caught me out, kid,” Matt admitted, smiling. 

“Watch it,” Evie said, all the tension gone now, “or Uncle Luke will make you pay the swear jar.” 

They returned briefly to Matt's apartment to wait for Claire and to say a proper goodbye.

“I made this for you.“ Evie handed Matt a key chain. It had two M-shaped charms on it, Matt’s initials. “I made it at the street fair my first weekend here. Feel the back.”

On the backs of both charms Matt found a Braille D, initials for his other persona. 

Matt fought back a memory of the time he tried to give Stick a present. He pulled his keys from his pocket and immediately transferred them to Evie's chain.

“I’ll treasure it, kid,” he said and was sure he could hear her wide smile.

“Come visit me in Atlanta,” she pleaded. “We have a guest room and my mom says you can come any time.”

“I’d like that, but I can’t leave my city right now. Why don’t you see if you can come again next summer. There are a lot more ice cream flavors we haven’t practiced tasting yet. Deal?”

“Deal!” she agreed happily. “Next summer you can teach me parkour.”

Then Claire was knocking on the door. “Hurry, Evie, you still need to pack for your trip tomorrow.”

“Matt, thank you,“ Luke told him on the phone that evening. “I don’t know what you’ve been saying to Evie, but it’s like there's a light inside her. She’s happier. Her mom noticed it on the phone, too.”

“Just wish her a safe trip,” Matt said.

 

That next evening Karen came along with Foggy to Matt’s loft.

They sat talking in the living room but with Karen there, conversation was a little more strained.

Karen broke the silence. “You seem different, Matt. Your world isn’t as dark.”

“My world is always dark,” he answered, “except for some fire-like impressions.”

“I don't mean how much you can or can't see,“ she continued. “It’s as if you have light inside you.”

Foggy agreed. “I think that you helping that kid let some light in.”

Matt was about to deny it, but he found that he had slipped his hand in his pocket to touch the key chain. He gave them a brief half smile instead.

“I’d like us to be friends again, Matt,” Karen said. 

“Only friends?” Matt asked. 

“For now,” Karen answered with a smile in her voice. “Then we'll see.”


End file.
